The regulator "did not sufficiently assess the susceptibility of highly illiquid, complex instruments," to ratings downgrades, Scott Polakoff told the banking committee in prepared testimony today. "In hindsight, OTS should have directed the company to stop originating credit-default swap products before December 2005."

When the Commodities Future Trading Commission tried to kill exotic derivatives in the latter half of the '90s, Rubin, Summers, Greenspan and Geithner told it to shit down and shut up while they legalised bucketeering.

Are you claiming the OTS would have had better luck under a Gore presidency than the CFTC had under the Clinton presidency? If so, on what grounds?

The Russian experience with Messrs Summer, Rubin and Geithner argues otherwise. (Leaving Greenspan to one side, as you surely did not mean to include that Randian hack in your statement in the first place.)

While some people saw one or more of these factors, virtually no one involved in the financial system--whether institutions, investors, regulators, analysts, or commentators--recognized the breadth of forces at work or the possibility of a megacrisis, and this included the most experienced among us. More personally, I regret that I, too, didn't see the potential for such extreme conditions despite my many years involved in financial matters and my concern for market excesses.